I can't provide a link because to access the article one has to register with Business Week, but they ran an interesting piece in the Jan 17th issue (page 24) by the Dean of the London School of Economics.  The gist of it was that there is no crisis in the Social Security system as it now stands, and the long term potential short falls can be solved by modest tax increases (or raising the cap on SS taxable income).  Further, she argues that  Bush's privatization proposal will CREATE A CRISIS by increading the national debt, and will put benefits of those who opt for "private accounts" at the tender mercies of the stock market.  The beneficiaries, of course, will be stock brokers and investment managers.  They really need the help though, so I guess younger workers should be willing to sacrifice their retirement to benefit this deprived and desperate group.

It bears repeating, the goal of the Republican party is to repeal the entire social contract developed from the New Deal through the Great Society.  If that means they have to create a phony crisis, that's what they'll do.  Tonight we're gonna party like it's 1929!

She is wrong....

Why would anybody in thier right mind not want to make Social Security private.  Social Security is YOUR money which our government takes by force.  Having private social security puts this money back into the hands of individuals (the moneys rightful owners).  Here are links to private plans that have worked (the galveston plan the retirement checks are actually bigger than the workers paychecks):

http://countrystudies.us/chile/45.htm

http://www.libertyhaven.com/politicsandcurrentevents/healthcarewelfareorsocialsecurity/galveston.shtml

She is wrong....

Why would anybody in thier right mind not want to make Social Security private.  Social Security is YOUR money which our government takes by force.  Having private social security puts this money back into the hands of individuals (the moneys rightful owners).   Here are links to private plans that have worked (the galveston plan the retirement checks are actually bigger than the workers paychecks):

http://countrystudies.us/chile/45.htm

http://www.libertyhaven.com/politicsandcurrentevents/healthcarewelfareorsocialsecurity/galveston.shtml

Social Security is not a retirement fund.  It is a form of social insurance.  Like I say, the Republican party is trying to wind the clock back to 1928, or even 1828.  You have just spewed forth the same trite propaganda the right-wingers have been pushing on the media over the past three years.  You aren't seeing the bigger picture...at least I hope you aren't.  The larger idea is to break down any sense of collective community among the American people.  The Bushies also want to remove all discussion from labor to capital.  That's also the idea behind the bogus "ownership society."

She is wrong....

Why would anybody in thier right mind not want to make Social Security private.  Social Security is YOUR money which our government takes by force.  Having private social security puts this money back into the hands of individuals (the moneys rightful owners).  Here are links to private plans that have worked (the galveston plan the retirement checks are actually bigger than the workers paychecks):

http://countrystudies.us/chile/45.htm

http://www.libertyhaven.com/politicsandcurrentevents/healthcarewelfareorsocialsecurity/galveston.shtml


Max is absolutely right.  Social Security is social insurance to take care of people.  There already is a
private account you can open, they call it savings.  You can also invest your money in an IRA.
God I can't stand the fact that working people know so little about the history of labor, the history
of the lives that their grandparents, great grandparents etc lived.  Go read stories about how real
people had to live there lives and how they died so that there could be programs like social security,
the eight hour day,  health insurance.  Go learn about how people still alive today had to go to work
at the age of 10 to help their families make enough money to eat.  What is going on in underdeveloped
countries today is the same thing that happened here in America not so long ago, but for some reason
to many believe that life in america has alway been like  "Leave it to Beaver" and that for some reason
fair play has always been the rule with the government and big corporations.  Jeeeeezzzz!

Max is absolutely right.  Social Security is social insurance to take care of people.  There already is a
private account you can open, they call it savings.  You can also invest your money in an IRA.
God I can't stand the fact that working people know so little about the history of labor, the history
of the lives that their grandparents, great grandparents etc lived.  Go read stories about how real
people had to live there lives and how they died so that there could be programs like social security,
the eight hour day,  health insurance.  Go learn about how people still alive today had to go to work
at the age of 10 to help their families make enough money to eat.  What is going on in underdeveloped
countries today is the same thing that happened here in America not so long ago, but for some reason
to many believe that life in america has alway been like  "Leave it to Beaver" and that for some reason
fair play has always been the rule with the government and big corporations.  Jeeeeezzzz!


Classic!  Usually when a poster can't argue the facts, they tell you "brush up on history".  The fact is social security is not going to go away just because it is now privatized. The only thing it would do is give the workers control of THIER money.  If you think government can spend peoples money better than they can, you are not a fan of the worker. You are instead a fan of big government.  That is Just like you socialist claim to be helping the worker through your sorry-ass government. Jeeeeeezzzzzzzz!

BTW:  I gave two links to private social security programs that work, yet you can't argue those.

Classic!  Usually when a poster can't argue the facts, they tell you "brush up on history".  The fact is social security is not going to go away just because it is now privatized. The only thing it would do is give the workers control of THIER money.  If you think government can spend peoples money better than they can, you are not a fan of the worker. You are instead a fan of big government.  That is Just like you socialist claim to be helping the worker through your sorry-a** government. Jeeeeeezzzzzzzz!

BTW:  I gave two links to private social security programs that work, yet you can't argue those.

Who would want "argue" with you?  You just repeated the same duckbilled platitudes you posted last time.  I have heard the arguments for privatization before, and I don't agree with them.  Why should I click on links just because you post them?  You aren't thinking, Screw, you are merely parroting what you hear on Rush, FNC, or whatever.

I think the problem most people have with the idea of privatising social security is that someone, somewhere will want to make a profit out of it and not plough the profit back into the scheme.

I've read one of the links that Screwball provided but I still can't quite understand how the Galveston scheme works.  Is it only for local government employees?  Or anyone working in that county?

I think the problem most people have with the idea of privatising social security is that someone, somewhere will want to make a profit out of it and not plough the profit back into the scheme.



It is not about Americans controlling their own money, as Screwball has been tricked into thinking, it's about forcing more Americans to submit to the will of Wall Street, and handing over a windfall of profits to the financial services industies.
::)

At least with private accounts your family can keep the money if you die early.  You work your as* off all your lift, then die one day before you were to recieve social security, and your family gets?  Nothing.  What a great system.

At least with private accounts your family can keep the money if you die early.  You work your as* off all your lift, then die one day before you were to recieve social security, and your family gets?  Nothing.  What a great system.

Not necessarily.  I know a disabled man who receives SSDI  via his late father's SS benefits.  But again, social security is not and never was meant to be a personal retirement fund.  If the Bushies want to start a program for private retirement accounts apart from SS, God bless them.  Just don't touch Social Security because SS is a different deal from a retirement account.
SS will need to be reformed eventually, but the Bushies don't want to reform it, they want to destroy it.
I thought it was appalling how Bush said Social Security was unfair to African American men because they don't live as long as whites.  He just accepts that as a fact of life!  What about addressing the real problems in America that cause African American lifespans to be shorter?  No way.  He's just going to make a lame attempt to exploit the fact to push his phony SS privatization scam!

At least with private accounts your family can keep the money if you die early.  You work your as* off all your lift, then die one day before you were to recieve social security, and your family gets?  Nothing.  What a great system.


If you die early your children recieve social security benefits until the are 18 (22 if they attend college).
You spouce recieves benefits.  They all recieve benefits when the become retirement age.  Private accounts are available.  They are called (once again) savings.  There are also IRA accounts.  It
isn't easy but I take advantage of these to bolster my retirement.

Classic!  Usually when a poster can't argue the facts, they tell you "brush up on history".  The fact is social security is not going to go away just because it is now privatized.



We tend to think that if you are going to argue a point you should have some background on what it
is you are talking about.  I take it you have been admonished before?

solved by modest tax increases (or raising the cap on SS taxable income)

Oh, is that all?

First of all, at this moment, S.S. is NOT in crisis. If Dubya gets his grubby little hands on it, it will be. We really should learn the lessons of other nations that privatization DOES NOT WORK! Screwball did use Chile as an example of the system working-but that link states that 79% of the work force receive benefits. You can bet that the other 21% who do not are the ones that really need it. The one example of the fact that privatization really does not work is Argentina. Here are a couple of links that different countries that tried this. The first one is just about Argentina and the second is about Argentia as well as Chile, UK, Australia, and Mexico.


http://www.cepr.net/argentina_and_ss_privatization.htm


http://www.cbo.gov/showdoc.cfm?index=1065&sequence=0




Cat

At least with private accounts your family can keep the money if you die early.  You work your as* off all your lift, then die one day before you were to recieve social security, and your family gets?  Nothing.  What a great system.


As has been pointed out, there are survivors' benefits available.  Yes, you can inherit $$$ for private accounts, if there is any.  As an educated person I know enough to stay away from the stock market, at least on my own, and not count on the investments I do have through TIAA-CREF or other insrtruments.  To expect the average joe to effectively manage a private account is nothing more than a game of russian roulete, except for the Wall Street commission guys.  To them it would be a bonanza.

As has been pointed out, there are survivors' benefits available.  Yes, you can inherit $$$ for private accounts, if there is any.  As an educated person I know enough to stay away from the stock market, at least on my own, and not count on the investments I do have through TIAA-CREF or other insrtruments.  To expect the average joe to effectively manage a private account is nothing more than a game of russian roulete, except for the Wall Street commission guys.  To them it would be a bonanza.

That's what I'm saying....the Wall Street fat cats for whom the Bushies work are leering at the gullable American public like a wolf peering over the fence at a flock of spring lambs!
(Hmmm...three animal analogies in one sentence....)

Who would want "argue" with you?  You just repeated the same duckbilled platitudes you posted last time.  I have heard the arguments for privatization before, and I don't agree with them.  Why should I click on links just because you post them?  You aren't thinking, Screw, you are merely parroting what you hear on Rush, FNC, or whatever.


You are the one who is not thinking.  I bielieve you should keep what you earn (duh).  Private social security would be a vast improvement as the Galveston and Chile programs have been proven to shown.  Social Security in it's current state is not going to work.  Why not check the links? I am tired of getting ripped off by the government. Social Security is a big scam. It is used to get people dependant on government for thier income.  You hate it when Big Corporations scam you, but it is ok for the government to do it?  Government is not supose to be used as a charity. YOU ARE BEING SCAMED!  Wake Up.

We tend to think that if you are going to argue a point you should have some background on what it
is you are talking about.  I take it you have been admonished before?


No,  I am saying you could not aurgue against privatization,  so you offer a lame history lesson.  Social security is a failure. Everyone knows it  Except those that believe what they are fed by the left.

No,  I am saying you could not argue against privatization,  so you offer a lame history lesson.  Social security is a failure. Everyone knows it  Except those that believe what they are fed by the left.


Privatized accounts are already available in the form of savings, IRA, personal retirement , and
pension accounts. Social Security as it is, is still much better than what we had before, which was absolutely nothing.  History shows us how life was without it.
Privatization not only will cost at minimum a trillion dollars in initial administration fees just to turn the
system over, it will also present a windfall to brokerage houses, not investors, and remove any guaranteed returns.  That is money better held on to in lock box accounts offering a guarantee of future monies available to pensioners.

I bielieve you should keep what you earn (duh).  Private social security would be a vast improvement as the Galveston and Chile programs have been proven to shown.  Social Security in it's current state is not going to work.   I am tired of getting ripped off by the government. Social Security is a big scam. It is used to get people dependant on government for thier income.  You hate it when Big Corporations scam you, but it is ok for the government to do it?  Government is not supose to be used as a charity. YOU ARE BEING SCAMED!  Wake Up.  (edited)


Keep what you earn?  Who will pay for schools, police, fire dept's, roads, the military, water treatment...or do you think you can hire all that on your own cheaper than we can do it as a community?

Chile's privatization has been a colossal failure for those who need it most, that is, those who can't aford to save as individuals.  That was especially the case under that fascist pig who outlawed strikes and allowed wages for many workers to fall below the subsistance level, if they were lucky enough to even have jobs. 

You are not "getting ripped off" by SS.  You will get the defined benefits you have earned from SS (unless Lil' Georgie screwa it up).  The rip-offs are more like the use of tax funds to support Lil' Georgie's political agends, as in the Ed Dept scandal and others that have since come to light.  Those you have not objected to - how come?

SS is one of the few gov't programs that IS NOT a big scam, nor is it a "charity".  Rather, it is our pledge to our forebearers that we will not leave them destitute.  Are you in a position to support your parants without sacrificing your life style?  Most people aren't.  Both my sister and I are quite comfortable, but it would be a real sacrifice if we had to support my father, and that would mean my kids would have to support me. 

You railed on Danoot for her history lesson, but she wqas right on.  Neither you nor your neocon buddies would like living in 1920, not to mention 1930.  You are just stuck on the neocon mantra, which you seem to accept without any attempt at critical analysis.

It's really boils down to who's money is it?  Yours or the governments?

It's really boils down to who's money is it?  Yours or the governments?


No, it doesn't.  It boils down to how best protect seniors from destitution - not just those in my family, but all seniors.  Or do we have no obligation to our forebearers?  Nor have you responded to the other issues I raised re paying for gov't services which you seem to take for granted.

You conservatives seem always to think that what you have is what you, on  your own, earned.  That is the biggerst crock of horse s... going.  Left to your own divises, unaided by all the perks you received from "society", my guess is that you would be dirt poor, and this country would be in really bad shape - not that its in such good shape now.

No, it doesn't.  It boils down to how best protect seniors from destitution - not just those in my family, but all seniors.  Or do we have no obligation to our forebearers?  Nor have you responded to the other issues I raised re paying for gov't services which you seem to take for granted.

You conservatives seem always to think that what you have is what you, on  your own, earned.  That is the biggerst crock of horse s... going.  Left to your own divises, unaided by all the perks you received from "society", my guess is that you would be dirt poor, and this country would be in really bad shape - not that its in such good shape now.

You might as well be speaking Swahili.  These guys don't get because decades of rightwing PR sometimes refered to as "news" has corrupted their thought processes.  There is no such thing as "the greater good," only "me, me, me, I, me, mine." 
I have often said it is the goal of the American Right to turn America into Latin America.  If you happen to be rich in Central America, you just buy whatever goods and services you need on the "free market," including your own private police.  Why would you rely on the corrupt bandits that serve the hoi poloi?  And if you're not rich, you live in cardboard hut and hope your kids don't die of cholera. 
The "commonweal," ha!, what a joke!

So what happens to your Social Securty when the Stock Market takes a nose dive just before you are ready to retire?




Cat

So what happens to your Social Securty when the Stock Market takes a nose dive just before you are ready to retire?




Cat

Why you askin' me?  That's YOUR problem!  Or you got a problem with taking personal responsibility for yerself?
:D

So what happens to your Social Securty when the Stock Market takes a nose dive just before you are ready to retire?




Cat


That is why you invest in products that never go down.  The market, over the long run, always go up.  Steel stocks, and energy stocks will not go down over a good period of time.

Remember back in 1998?  When our government got that surplus?  That sparked a big national debate on how to spend that surplus.  The republicans said the government was taking in to much money and destroying pure economic freedom, so the said use the surplus for tax cuts.  The democrats said we need to use the budget surplus to fix the social security crisis.  That was from our very own, impeached disgraced former President.....Clinton.  He said we had a huge social security crisis in 1998, and every democrat agreed with him.  Now?  Here is an article from a leftist.....

Read this:

"Who will rescue Social Security?"  On two of the biggest issues confronting Congress and the Clinton administration -- Social Security and Medicare -- it is hard to find anyone optimistic about action in the coming year.  Everyone I interviewed agrees there may be a small window of opportunity -- six to eight months -- to deal with these two vital programs before the politics of the next election overwhelm everything. But few of those interviewed at either end of Pennsylvania Avenue have high hopes. One dissenter from the general gloom is Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon, who lobbied me over breakfast to write optimistically about the chances of a bipartisan breakthrough that would avoid the bankruptcy that threatens Medicare within the next decade and Social Security about 20 years later.

President Clinton will play host to the last of four roundtables on Social Security reform, with invitations out to key members of Congress from both parties and all the major interest groups. Since last January, Clinton has emphasized the importance of 'saving Social Security first.' He said he hoped to hammer out a bipartisan plan once the campaign was out of the way. But the closer this White House summit has come, the more administration officials have backed away from any expectations of a breakthrough. Gene Sperling, the head of the White House National Economic Council, which is staffing the session, told me, 'If the right people come and really engage, it could lay the foundation for working together in a pragmatic way. But this is not going to be a negotiating session. It can't happen in a day and a half.' Privately, many in the administration are far more pessimistic. While Democrats did not make Social Security as much a partisan issue in the 1998 campaign as in some past years, the lines are now being drawn. Conservative think tanks such as the CATO Institute and the Heritage Foundation want Republicans to insist on converting a portion of future Social Security taxes into individual savings accounts. Labor and its allies, which are owed a lot by the Democrats, next week will announce a major effort to block any such change."

When was this written?  Obviously the Clinton administration, Sunday, November 29th, 1998, "Who Will Rescue Social Security" by David S. Broder in the Washington Post.  Here is the link to that old article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/special/security/stories/oss112998.htm

So the left and Clinton siad there was a huge social security crisis back in 1998 when we had that surplus.  But now, well there is no crisis.  If that isn't blatant liberal hypocrisy on social security, I don't know what is.

That is why you invest in products that never go down.  The market, over the long run, always go up.  Steel stocks, and energy stocks will not go down over a good period of time.


So the left and Clinton siad there was a huge social security crisis back in 1998 when we had that surplus.  But now, well there is no crisis.  If that isn't blatant liberal hypocrisy on social security, I don't know what is.



Which steel companies would you suggest, Bethleham, What was U.S. Steel?  Which energy co's, Enron?  There are no safe investments aside from low yield Gov't bonds, the kind the SS trust fund holds, and sometimes thier yield is higher than mutual funds.  Therein lies what crisis there is.  Since the SS fund holds gov't securities (part of the national debt) there may come a time when it needs to cash out some of that paper, and the general budget will have to make good on that obligation.

There is a difference between being hypocritical and being wrong.  Clearly, if left unchanged, the SS system will reach a point where its income will not be sufficient to pay current benefits and it will have to use the interest on the trust fund.  In time (around 2075 according to some economists) it will have to liquidate its gov't paper to pay bennies.  That can be resolved by simply eliminating the cap on SS taxable income.  Or maybe Congress could balance the budget again and stop raiding the SS trust fund.

KILL THE CAP - BALANCE THE BUDGET

And might I also suggest that you Neocons study some economics instead of parroting your ideologue pundants.

First of all, at this moment, S.S. is NOT a crisis.


But yet global warming is an immediate crisis and we must pass laws now to stop this problem before it kills us all?

Think about it, you and the left say social security is a crisis, yet the most generous estimates put it in 50 years.  Yet global warming, which is something that would take thousands of years is an immediate problem?  Are people on the left that blind?

But yet global warming is an immediate crisis and we must pass laws now to stop this epidemic before it kills us all?

Think about it, you and the left say social security is a crisis, yet the most generous estimates put it in 50 years.  Yet global warming, which is something that would take thousands of years is an immediate problem?  Are people on the left that blind?



I don't understand why we are talking about Social Security and you bring up Global Warming. I don't see the connection.

IF, and I do mean IF S.S. is in crisis, privatizing it will not solve the problem-it will only make things much worse than it is now. A few years ago, I put my IRA into the Stock Market. Then the Market took a nose dive. It came back a little but not too much. In fact in the last week, I noticed that my stocks are down again. The Market is not a sure thing. It has crashed in the past and could again in the future. It happened in 1929 and again in 1987. What would happen if it crashed right before you retired?  I am lucky because I have other means for my future. But, if that was my only source like many have with S.S. I would be S.O.L. (s**t outta luck). It is very dangerous going this route. And to do so will take the "security" out of Social Secuity. As I have said before, look at other countries who tried it. It has FAILED!!! .

Social Security as we know it, is not perfect, but it works-and has since 1935.




Cat

I don't understand why we are talking about Social Security and you bring up Global Warming. I don't see the connection.

I was going to suggest GWB look up the word "epidemic."
::)

I say again, social security is not a retirement fund, it is social insurance.  If the Bushies want to help people set up personal retirement accounts, great.  Just don't sabotage SS to do it.  Of course, the Bushies want to sabotage SS because they want to wind the clock back to 1928. 
As the debate goes on, the administration's agenda on this matter gets ever more transparent and looks weaker and weaker.  The problem with the hot-headed ideological divisiveness around important issues is that it compels folks to stick to bad ideas to save face.

But yet global warming is an immediate crisis and we must pass laws now to stop this epidemic before it kills us all?

Think about it, you and the left say social security is a crisis, yet the most generous estimates put it in 50 years.  Yet global warming, which is something that would take thousands of years is an immediate problem?  Are people on the left that blind?


While you really  need to look up "epidemic" you also need to get a clue about economics and ecology/meteorology.  But i'll start a thread on global warming, rather than detract from this "discussion".

While you really  need to look up "epidemic" you also need to get a clue about economics and ecology/meteorology.  But i'll start a thread on global warming, rather than detract from this "discussion".

And he needs to study the art of rhetoric regarding analogies that work versus analogies that do not work!
:D ;D :D

And he needs to study the art of rhetoric regarding analogies that work versus analogies that do not work!
:D ;D :D


Well, when one's chief source of info is Foux News and the Drudge Report, can you expect literacy?

I don't understand why we are talking about Social Security and you bring up Global Warming. I don't see the connection.

IF, and I do mean IF S.S. is in crisis, privatizing it will not solve the problem-it will only make things much worse than it is now. A few years ago, I put my IRA into the Stock Market. Then the Market took a nose dive. It came back a little but not too much. In fact in the last week, I noticed that my stocks are down again. The Market is not a sure thing. It has crashed in the past and could again in the future. It happened in 1929 and again in 1987. What would happen if it crashed right before you retired?  I am lucky because I have other means for my future. But, if that was my only source like many have with S.S. I would be S.O.L. (s**t outta luck). It is very dangerous going this route. And to do so will take the "security" out of Social Secuity. As I have said before, look at other countries who tried it. It has FAILED!!! .

Social Security as we know it, is not perfect, but it works-and has since 1935.




Cat


Catwoman, putting your personal experience in the stock market aside, allow me to put my two cents in here.  The Bush plan currently has no specific details.  But this is my understanding, generally, of how it will work.  Please correct me if I'm wrong.  Only 4% of your contributions will be eligible for the personal account.  And your investment options will be eextremelylimited to very conservative funds made up of both stocks and bonds.  Federal employees now contribute to similar funds in their Thrift and Savings Plans.  Relatively speaking, the funds in that plan are, once again, very conservative.  So if the stock market crashed just prior to retirement, the negative affect on any one individual would not be too drastic.  In addition, I'd like to hear from the naysayers what is wrong with the Galveston plan.  There is NO investing in the stock market in that plan.  There are no Wall Street suits getting rich off of those 3 Texas counties.  What is the downside of that plan, other than it somehow goes against the typical socialist mantra?  As far as the argument about SS being 'social iinsurance that, in my opinion, is silly rhetoric.  SS is a huge governmental bureaucratic mess, and we need to fix it, revamp it, or scrap it and start over.  I think for some people, and you know who you are, this is simply another reason to attack George Bush.  If Clinton had attempted this, he would be hailed as a visionary.

Catwoman, putting your personal experience in the stock market aside, allow me to put my two cents in here.  The Bush plan currently has no specific details.  But this is my understanding, generally, of how it will work.  Please correct me if I'm wrong.  Only 4% of your contributions will be eligible for the personal account.  And your investment options will be eextremelylimited to very conservative funds made up of both stocks and bonds.  Federal employees now contribute to similar funds in their Thrift and Savings Plans.  Relatively speaking, the funds in that plan are, once again, very conservative.  So if the stock market crashed just prior to retirement, the negative affect on any one individual would not be too drastic.  In addition, I'd like to hear from the naysayers what is wrong with the Galveston plan.  There is NO investing in the stock market in that plan.  There are no Wall Street suits getting rich off of those 3 Texas counties.  What is the downside of that plan, other than it somehow goes against the typical socialist mantra?  As far as the argument about SS being 'social iinsurance that, in my opinion, is silly rhetoric.  SS is a huge governmental bureaucratic mess, and we need to fix it, revamp it, or scrap it and start over.  I think for some people, and you know who you are, this is simply another reason to attack George Bush.  If Clinton had attempted this, he would be hailed as a visionary.


A few comments, and I'll start at the bottom.

Can we please stop harping on Clinton?  He did attempt a major reform (health insurance) and got stomped by everyone who sees health care as a profit engine.  In that case he should have "been hailed as a visionary" instead of pilloried.

How anyone can say SS is a "bureaucratic mess" is beyond me.  Clearly there are foul-ups, as in any massive program, but SS is one of the few gov't programs that has been a success over the long haul.

In order for "personal accounts" to do better than the benefits SS would provide, they would have to do better than 3% over the long haul.  Anything less, and what you would have gotten as a garanteed benefit would be better.  "Very conservative" investments don't do much better than that.  Long term money market certificates  pay less than 3% last time I looked.  "Stocks and bonds" portfolios may be slanted to the conservative side, but again, don't pay much more than that 3% and could actually pay less.

Beyond all that, which applies to the individual, there is the problem of paying the promised benefits to the hundreds of thousands of people who will not be eligible for this scheme, which could cost as much as $ 3 trillion, which would have to be added to the national debt.  Already, because od the record deficits we now face, foreign investors, who hold almost half of our national debt and therefore are funding almost half our deficit, are becoming nervious, according to recent reports.  Should they stop investing in our gov't bonds the results could be catostrophic for our economy.

Let me draw an analogy.  A major part of our cold war strategy was to use our economic might to force the USSR to "spend itself to death".  You can find the documentation in de-cassifieed State Dept. documents.  The USSR was forced to spend trillions on ultimately useless defense crap, could not provide for its people, and so collapsed.

And just to add another aspect to this, I note tyhat Lil' Georgie has not included the cost of war in either Iraq or Afganistan in his budget, yet those adventures will drain billions from our economy over the next few years.  I refer you to Paul Kennedy's old book called, I think, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers which demonstrates that empires grow weak because they have to invest so many resources in economically useless military spending to the detriment of social well being, infrastructure, research and development etc.  In that light I note that Lil' Georgie has proposed cutting Vets benefits, medicaid, and education funding. 

Looks to me like Lil' Georgie and his ideological handlers are out to return us to the late 19th Century, and are likely to destroy the goose that laid the golden egg of US prosperity after WWII.

Nothing like a little humor to teach....:

http://www.sacredcowburgers.com/parodies/socialist_stupidity.jpg

If you can't read it and can't expand it, here is a link to view a larger version: http://www.sacredcowburgers.com/parodies/socialist_stupidity.jpg

Nothing like a little humor to teach....:

http://www.sacredcowburgers.com/parodies/socialist_stupidity.jpg

If you can't read it and can't expand it, here is a link to view a larger version: http://www.sacredcowburgers.com/parodies/socialist_stupidity.jpg

Sigh.  No thanks.  But "social stupidity" is the way of the Right!

Nothing like a little humor to teach....:

http://www.sacredcowburgers.com/parodies/socialist_stupidity.jpg

If you can't read it and can't expand it, here is a link to view a larger version: http://www.sacredcowburgers.com/parodies/socialist_stupidity.jpg


Teach what, that some right wing ideologs want to destroy SS?  We all knew that. 

It baffles the mind that right wingers think of SS as "socialist", a word that they just don't understand.  SS as now constructed, "provides for the general welfare" by relieving working and middle class people of the necessity of totally providing for their aging parants, which makes it easier for them to provide for their children, with like college educations.  SS doesn't alter the onership of capital in any way and therefore can't be considered "socialist".

Recent statements from evan the administration indicate that the real aim is to dismantle the social safty net and return us to the late 19th Century, in other words, to turn ouir country over to the would be robber barons like Ken Lay and Bernie Ebbers.

Oh, and by the way, I have my own "individual retirement account" that I WILL be able to pass on to my kids, unlike the annuity accounts that Lil' Georgie is proposing.  You might want to check out how annuity accounts work before you...